Obama defends NSA surveillance

BURBANK, Calif. — Pressed by Jay Leno about the surveillance operations revealed by National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden, President Barack Obama expressed frustration that the programs had gone public, but said he has every confidence that they are being used properly.

“We don’t have a domestic spying program. What we do have is some mechanisms that can track a phone number or an email address that is connected to a terrorist attack,” Obama told Leno on Tuesday night.

Text Size

-

+

reset

Obama said he doubted the utility of the programs himself when he first got into office, but after seeing their influence in the fight against terrorism and seeing the results of an internal review he ordered, he overcame those doubts.

“We should be skeptical about the potential encroachments on privacy. None of the revelations show that we have abused these powers, but they’re pretty significant powers,” Obama said.

He invoked the Boston Marathon bomber investigation as a prime example of why the programs are useful, saying that intelligence was helped enormously by investigating all the people the Tsarnaev brothers were in touch with to see if they were connected to any larger networks or plots.

“If we can make sure that there’s confidence on the part of the American people that there’s oversight, then I think we can make sure that we’re properly balanced in our liberty and our security,” Obama said.